


Show Him

by midnightsnapdragon



Series: Nostalgia [14]
Category: Lunar Chronicles - Marissa Meyer
Genre: Canon Divergent, F/M, What if?, but also hopeful?, dramatic reveals, sort of angsty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-06
Updated: 2017-09-06
Packaged: 2018-12-24 11:49:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12012102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/midnightsnapdragon/pseuds/midnightsnapdragon
Summary: On the day of the peace festival, when Kai comes to Cinder's booth one last time before his coronation, there's a moment when she considers removing her glove and showing him her hand - the cyborg hand. In canon, she decides not to, but this is how it might have happened.





	Show Him

_“So why are you ignoring me? Did I do something?”_

_Cinder drew back, knowing she should tell him. He thought she was a mere mechanic, and he was, perhaps, willing to cross that social divide. But to be both cyborg and Lunar? To be hated and despised by every culture in the galaxy? He would understand in a moment why he needed to forget her._

-Cinder, page 292.

*

_Pull off the gloves and show him._

Maybe it was exasperation with how he persisted in coming after her – coming to her booth on market day, even in the heat, even with his looming coronation, with a gold-wrapped gift in his hands. Maybe it was a bout of temporary insanity. Or maybe it was the fact that she couldn’t take the lie anymore that made her grip the fingers of her left glove and yank it off.

The metal plating flashed in the brilliant sunlight. Kai blinked into the glare, still looking confused from their conversation, and reflexively glanced down at the reflective surface.

And froze.

Cinder stared up at him, clenching her jaw, hackles already rising in her own defence. She held her left hand out stiffly in front of her, letting it reflect into his eyes.

There was no going back now. No use pretending.

Kai stared down at her hand, his mouth slightly open. The box fell from his arms and thudded softly onto the table, but he didn’t seem to notice. He looked as though he couldn’t process what he was seeing – as if his brain insisted that the metal hand _had_ to be separate from the rest of her, but it wasn’t, and trying to reconcile with this was causing an error message

The very thought made Cinder want to laugh at herself – imagining Kai as a cyborg, one who had the same computerized brain that she did? There had never been anyone more human than him.

The people around them kept milling around. Earth did not stop moving. The noise and chatter and breathless August heat flooded into the quiet bubble that had formed around the crown prince and the mechanic, pulling them back to reality.

Cinder pressed her lips together and withdrew her hand into her lap. 

“You,” Kai started, and cut himself off. Slowly, his eyes traveled from the table, where her metal hand had been a moment before, and up to her face. She couldn’t read his expression – confusion, disbelief, shock, uncertainty. One after the other. “You’re …”

“Cyborg,” she said, through gritted teeth. Why was it so hard for him to say it? To believe what his eyes told him? He ought to get it over with and leave the market, leave forever. It would be easier that way for both of them.

Kai searched her face, brows drawn. Closed-off. His carefree smile was gone, and the disbelief had been replaced with an sort of distrustful incredulity. “You … didn’t say.”

Cinder lifted her chin, defiance in her eyes. “And why do you think?” She had thought that if this happened, she would feel humiliated, feel regret for what she’d lost – but no. She was angry. “Can you think of any _possible_ reason that I did not volunteer this information?”

He shook his head. The princely mask she’d seen before – the one he’d always taken down in front of her – went up again, all tact and diplomacy, and it hurt her more than anything. “I’m sorry. This isn’t my business.”

“You’ve made it your business,” Cinder bit out, and immediately regretted it. Her words were black and bitter, even to her own ears.

She needed to be calm. Respectful.

As befitted a subject and her ruler.

“I ignored your comms,” she said, more slowly this time. “I refused your invitation. I tried to make it clear, but you –“

“Make _what_ clear?”

“That it wasn’t going to come to anything! You brought me your android, I fixed it. End of story.”

Those last three words hung between them like a veil. The look in his eyes – hurt, confusion, sudden clarity – almost stopped the little electrical pulses in her fingers. He could see the social divide between them. Finally, after ignoring it for so long … he saw.

Cinder looked away, down at the tablecloth. The meticulously arranged nuts and bolts and screws, the wrenches and wire-cutters.

“Perhaps,” she said quietly, “you should reconsider your offer.”

Kai looked away, too; he squared his shoulders, hands behind his back. The pose was so kingly that she wondered if he‘d practised it.

Vendors and customers chattered around them. The news reporter on the corner was still going on about the peace festival celebration. None of it mattered.

Finally, after an eternity, Kai cleared his throat. “I’m sorry. I’ve been …” He shook his head, still not meeting her eyes. “Presumptuous. You –” For the first time, he seemed to be struggling with words. “You tried to keep your distance, I see that now. But –“

“Kai,” she blurted, without thinking. “Spare me the speech. Please? Spare us both.”

He looked up. Opened his mouth – stopped himself. Slowly … nodded. “Yes. Sorry.”

Cinder met his gaze. Waited.

Kai didn’t move. He wavered there, at her mechanic booth, dragging out the time.

 _He doesn’t want to leave,_ she realized. Maybe he wanted an explanation, or an apology. Maybe he wanted to rewind the last few minutes as much as she did.

“You should, um …” Cinder gestured to the gold-foil-wrapped box. If she’d been human, her cheeks would have been burning. Her face, her lips, her heart, all gone up in flames. “You should bring that with you. Give it to some other girl.”

“No,” he said at once, shaking his head. “It’s a gift.”

His honour wouldn’t let him take it back. Cinder couldn’t accept it. Under any other circumstances, she would have rolled her eyes at the stalemate. Instead, she stared at the box, wondering what was inside, and whether she could ever undo the pretty white ribbon.

“Please, take it.” Kai stretched out a hand and pushed it across the table, closer to her. And then he tried for a smile – a flickering, wistful smile. “And think of me.”

Cinder stared up at him, knowing that her expression was just as raw as his. She had abandoned her own mask, the pretense of indifference and politesse. Surely he could see how much this was hurting her, too. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

He met her eyes, nd looked away. Down at the table. “Me, too.” It was so softly spoken she wasn’t sure if she’d imagined it. Kai turned to leave, to disappear into the market crowd, and hesitated – glanced back.

"My request still stands, by the way.” There was an uncertain note in his voice. “If you change your mind.”

All she could do was nod.

He looked as if he wanted to say something more, but only shook his head and walked away.

Cinder waited until she lost sight of his gray hoodie. Then she reached out and carefully took the gold box in her hands. The glinting light off the foil wrapping matched the shine of her metal fingers. Quickly, so that no one would see, she bent down and placed the box under the table, out of sight.

She would open it later, when she was on her way to Europe.

“Cinder, here, take these.”

She blinked as Pearl appeared out of nowhere, slamming down a pile of boxes onto the table. It was such a sudden change of company that Cinder couldn’t understand, at first, what it was that her stepsister wanted. She could only stare at where Kai had vanished into the crowd.

“Put them somewhere near the back, where they won’t get stolen,” said Pearl, waving a hand, not even looking at her. “Somewhere _clean,_ if such a place exists.”

“Fine.”

Pearl tossed her head and sashayed off.

When she had gone, Cinder exhaled a slow, shuddering breath, and put her head into her hands.

 _It could have been worse,_ she thought miserably. _He was polite. He was a gentleman. It could have been so, so much worse._

He might have also found out that she was _Lunar._

Stars, that would really have been a disaster.


End file.
